Capital of Nasty Electronic Magazine Volume II, Issue 6, Year AD MCMXCVII Monday, February 10th, 1997 Happy New Year - Friday, February 7th, 1997 ------------------------------------------- "This is the way I see it: life is a game." "So all you gotta do is figure out the rules?" "No. All you gotta do is cheat." ------------------------------------------- "Napoleon never discussed details". Fidel Castro answering journalists who had asked about details between the Canada-Cuba relationship. ------------------------------------------- 1. The Names of our Institutions 2. life is so strange 3. Junk e-mail 4. Internet News ------------------------------------------- 1. The Names of our Institutions Colin Barrett Over one hundred years ago, in the City of Toronto, George owned a newspaper, the Globe, which was one of the forerunners of the Globe and Mail--Canada's national newspaper. George was an upstanding, religious man in his community. He attended service regularly at St. James Cathedral on King Street, where there was a pew reserved for only George and his family and no one else. One day, George upset one of his compositors (the common term today is typesetter) by firing him. I'm sure we could imagine that this unemployed individual would be very irate, since he probably worked long hours for little pay in order to take good care of his family. Years of faithful service resulted in a boot out the door. In order to quench his anger, the comp walked to the nearest watering hole. We do not know what this man drank that day at the pub, nor in what quantities he drank. What we do know is that drinking only served to increase his anger. He went back to the plant and shot George. The medical world could not help George except change his sheets on occasion. In those days, when someone was shot in the groin, that person would just bleed to death. George Brown suffered for two weeks. As a student of George Brown College, I do not know whether my school is named after George Brown because he was one of the founders of the Globe and Mail, because he fired a typesetter, or because he fell victim to a drunk's bad aim. ------------------------------------------- 2. life is so strange by leandro (ordnael@freenet.hut.fi) Life at times is a rather ironic experience. It is a incredible combination of events, and I guess it depends by us to make them beautiful or sad. I was waiting at Wellesley Subway station, with no trains in sight. "We're experiencing slight delays at Dupont station, on the Yonge line" kept repeating a voice over the subway's P.A. systems. "The delays" the voice explained "are caused by electrical problems". I've heard the "electrical problem" excuse a million times now. I used to think at one time, that seriously, the trains kept on blowing fuses or something. That was until one day, at Coxwell station, a woman decided she was tired with life and jumped in front of the train, on the same platform I was standing on. As the police asked me what happened, I heard the voice over the P.A. announce that Coxwell station was experiencing "electrical problems". People jumping in front of trains don't even make the news anymore. In fact, in about 30 minutes from the accident, service had already been restored. I found myself cursing whoever was responsible for the delay at Dupont station, but then decided to go quiet, if indeed it was someone who had decided to become permament part of the railtracks. I was just going home, what were a few minutes more going to do to me anyway? I'll never understand this sudden urge to get my destination that I always get once I am waiting for the subway. The voice over the P.A. announced that the problems at Dupont station had been cleared up and that service had been restored. Not long after that, a train arrived. I got off at Yonge station, where the North-South-North line crosses the East-Westbound line, and walked down to the platform facing Eastbound. Ironically a train arrived right away. I sit down, look out of the window, and I see Davinder, my platonic friend. She was standing on the Westbound platform, talking to her sisters and a couple of friends. I got up and as I was about to dask out of the car, the doors closed, causing me to slam rather violently against them. Everyone looked at me as if I was some sort of a freak as I cursed at the door. In that moment a train arrived on the other track and she climbed aboard. I sat down, beat, trying to figure out the meaning of all that. ------------------------------------------- 3. Junk e-mail by leandro (ordnael@freenet.hut.fi) Each time I post a message in a newsgroup, I am automatically giving my e-mail address to thousand of those newgroup-browser programs that collect e-mail addresses and then send annoying advertising. Most of the time, if you reply to the message asking them to be removed, your mail bounces back with a message stating that 'address could not be resolved'. This got a little frustrating after a while when I kept getting more and more of this virtual crap. So I began my crusade. Each message that is sent to me, usually has one piece of correct information (a respond address to place your order, a web site). I look for those, then perform a WHOIS at the Internic server. For those that don't know, Internic is a company that deals with keeping track and assigning the names to the correct IP number. By queering their database, it is possible to see who owns the respective site, with their E-MAIL address. I simply forward the message to that address. I would love to mail-bomb these individuals, but first of all, I would be clogging the wires as well with tons of useless e-mails, and many of this computers are made to handle lots of incoming e-mail. But it still gets on my nerves. There is no way of stopping this abuse, you can't put a "no flyer" sign on your mailbox. For now, all you can do is try to get removed from mailing lists via the URLs written below, or set up filters that automatically forward the mail back. To survive on Usenet, divide your e-mail address in two by placing a space between your name and your domain name (ie. leandro @ifront.com). Computer programs are not that smart.. yet. Guide to Spam, Abuse and Internet Advertising http://com.primenet.com/spamking Internet Spam Control Center http://drsvc.com/nospam/ns2.shtml Stop Junk Email http://www.mcs.net/~jcr/junkemail.html Blacklist of Internet Advertisers: http://www-math.uni-paderborn.de Berkley Remailer List http://www.cs.berkley.edu/~raph/remailer-list.html Fight Spam on the Internet http://www.vix.com/spam ------------------------------------------- 4. Internet News INTERNET PHONE CHARGES Peter Fung Your local telephone company has filed a proposal with the FCC to impose per minute charges for your internet service. They contend that your usage has or will hinder the operation of the telephone network. Internet usage will diminish if users were required to pay additional per minute charges. The FCC has created an email box for your comments, responses must be received by February 13, 1997. Send your comments to isp@fcc.gov and tell them what you think. Every phone company is in on this one, and they are trying to sneak it in just under the wire for litigation. Let everyone you know hear this one. Get the e-mail address to everyone you can think of. isp@fcc.gov Please forward this email to all your friends on the internet so all our voices may be heard! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - INTERNET DOMAIN NAMES ADDED: Beginning in July, the Interent will have seven new top-level domain names: .firm, .store, .web, .arts, .rec, .info, and .nom. TELECOM UPDATE Number 69: FEBRUARY 10, 1997 http://www.angustel.ca -------------------------------------------